Panthers’ Matheson beats clock, Penguins with OT goal

Mike Matheson scored with 45.6 seconds left in overtime as the host Florida Panthers defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-2 on Thursday night. It was Matheson's fifth goal of the season. Jonathan Huberdeau earned the primary assist. Aleksander Barkov picked up his second assist of the night and has 301 career points.

Florida also got goals from Colton Sceviour and Evgenii Dadonov. Sceviour's goal was just his fourth of the season and his first since Dec. 6. Dadonov's goal, his 19th, ended his eight-game drought. Pittsburgh got goals from Jared McCann -- who was acquired from the Panthers last week -- and Marcus Pettersson.

It was McCann's ninth goal of the season and his first with the Penguins. For Pettersson, a defenseman, it was his second career goal and his first this season. The Penguins -- losers of three consecutive games -- were without star center Evgeni Malkin (upper-body injury). Malkin has missed four straight games.

Casey DeSmith, playing just his 44th NHL game, made 39 saves for Pittsburgh. He started in place of Matt Murray, who is on the injured list for the third time this season, this time with an upper body ailment. He missed one game in November due to a concussion and was out for four weeks in December due to a lower body injury. Florida's Roberto Luongo, who at age 39 is 12 years older than DeSmith, made 29 saves for Florida. It was Luongo's first start in six days and his first win since Jan. 21.

Florida opened the scoring on Dadonov's power-play goal with 5:22 elapsed in the first period. Pittsburgh tied the score with 13:51 gone in the second period on McCann's short-handed odd-man rush. With only Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad back and Bryan Rust on his left, McCann kept the puck and fired it past Luongo.

It was McCann's second career short-handed goal, and both have come this season. Florida took a 2-1 lead with just 2:28 left in the second period. Nine seconds after Pittsburgh had killed off a Rust slashing penalty on Florida's Mike Hoffman, Barkov slid a soft pass back to Sceviour, who beat DeSmith with a high shot to his glove side.

Pittsburgh tied the score 2-2 on Pettersson's shot through traffic with 11:43 left in the third period. --Field Level Media

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